Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Bread and Circuses

Will games become the new social divide?TIMEreports this week that 70 percent of big companies will embrace gamification in 2013.While most will use gamification to attract customers, many companies—40 percent, according to new research from Gartner—will embrace it as an employee-retention tool.Endorsing the latter, 20-something gamifier Katherine Heisler recently urged readers of Forbes to gamify the jobs of next-gen workers.Citing a new workplace survey by MTV, Heisler argues that "Millenials overwhelmingly agree that their jobs should reflect their lifestyle."The workplace, in short, should be "social and fun.""Some people think of my generation as lazy, good-for-nothing slackers, feeling entitled to everything and entirely lacking a work ethic," Heisler writes. "But that’s wrong: Millennials have an incredible work ethic. We want to work, we want to succeed and want to reshape the world in our image. We are simply motivated in non-traditional ways."When I was young and struggling alongside my fellow Boomers for a handhold on the slippery corporate ladder, money was a pretty good motivator.But—excluding those at the very top of the ladder—money's in short supply today.Will employers compensate for today's measly paychecks with "social and fun?"Will circuses take the place of bread?